Hello activists, my name is Erick. I live in a favela in Rio de Janeiro. I am a Youth Advocate at UNICEF Brazil and I study pedagogy at UERJ.
Today I’m here to share a little about fighting hate speech. I fight hate speech through Coletivo Arteração, which is a collective that I founded for young people, by young people.
At Coletivo Arteração, we talk about education, culture, health, and social action. We also discuss about the environment, citizenship, and socio-productive inclusion.
Aligning with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN 2030 Agenda, we work on fighting hate speech. We do this by using culture, education, and trainings. In this way, you can turn other people into activists, mobilizers, and articulators.
And the coolest thing is that it is peer education. Do you know when you catch a young person teaching another young person? A child teaching another child, or a teenager teaching another teenager? This is exactly how we work. We believe that through the micro, we can transform the macro.
So, you start at your school, in your neighborhood, then in your city. Soon you will be walking around the country and even the world. This doesn’t have to be in person alone. You can do it online, you can do it in person, you can do it in several ways.
Above all, you need to believe in the power of activism. Don’t limit yourself because of your age. It doesn’t matter if you are young, if you are a child, or if you are a teenager. Unite with other people like you and invest in peer education.
We can, from micro to macro, combat hate speech. We can fight prejudice, bullying, racism, and intolerance. And that’s how other organizers, other mobilizers and other activists will be created.
So, let’s come together to fight hate speech. Don’t let other people suffer in silence. Combatting hate speech is a collective fight, and we need to unite for world peace.